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Saturday, June 25, 2011

With the 129th pick (fifth round) in the NHL Entry Draft today, the Devils selected left wing Blake Pietila from the U.S. National Team Development Program.

Pietila (5-foot-11, 189 pounds) was the 105th ranked North American skater by NHL's Central Scouting. He put up 13 goals and 9 assists in 52 games in 2010-11.

Pietila is headed to Michigan Tech and is a native of Milford, Mich. He put up five goals and 2 assists in 4 games at the Five Nations Cup in February and then had a goal and no assists in six games as the U.S. won gold at the World Under-18 championships in April in Germany.

Pietila descibes himslef as a power forward who likes to skate and play physical.

About

TOM GULITTI has covered the New Jersey Devils for The Record since 2002. Prior to that, he covered the New York Rangers for four years. Gulitti joined The Record in 1998 after six years at The North Jersey Herald News. He graduated from Binghamton University in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts in Rhetoric-Literature.